Kerry would say something like, "The president didn't make the right judgments," and it was as if the DJ had kicked up the dance music, leaving the crowd surging and sexed-up.
"He's lost jobs."
"Yes!" yelled Thomas Rhode, a freelance photographer.
"He didn't fund No Child Left Behind."
"Yes!" he yelled again, and put his hand on his girlfriend Rita Chicone's hip.
"Let me tell you straight up: I've never changed my mind about Iraq," Kerry continued.
Rhode leaned in closer.
"This president rushed to war."
Rhode grabbed her shoulders and kissed her.
"He looks like some B-movie actor," Rhode said about Bush, and then to Chicone: "You look great."
Angry or Boring?
If there are intellectual vanguards for the young left, they are sitting around the Lombard-Freid gallery in Chelsea on a Saturday night, waiting to drive to Dayton, Ohio. There's Raza, the grad student, James Fuentes, who runs the gallery, A'yen Tran, a publicist for a TV show, Robyn Siegel, an artist, and Catherine Despont, a writer.
The mission of D4D (Downtown for Democracy) is to "bring the aesthetics into politics," says Tran, and to bring some of that new aestheticized politics to the heartland. On each trip they go to a college campus, throw one huge "New York-style party" -- meaning open bar, projectors and DJ -- and register voters.
Their bags are packed; the iPods are ready. The last time they had a DJ along, and "I could have driven forever," says Raza.
"This is my third trip and I haven't met anyone I didn't like. People are self-selecting. If you're the kind of person who likes Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson, you're more likely to be there."
D4D was started by gallery owner Bronwyn Keenan to take the disconnected voices of artists and turn them into a movement. They started out throwing fundraisers, art auctions and a sort of avant-garde street fair to raise money.
